


Tibet is Magic

by AKA (TyeDyeBoogers)



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, Platonic Soulmates, Romantic Soulmates, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:14:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24818200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TyeDyeBoogers/pseuds/AKA
Summary: Soulmarks appear before you're to meet your soulmate, the first words you will hear them say. Nathalie never expected that her words would appear somewhere in Tibet, or if she'd want a soulmate at all. Fate is funny.
Relationships: Emilie Agreste & Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth, Emilie Agreste & Nathalie Sancoeur, Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth/Nathalie Sancoeur
Comments: 8
Kudos: 27





	Tibet is Magic

**Author's Note:**

> This story follows the same soulmark rules as [my previous soulmate story](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24767866%20rel=). Soulmarks appear before you are to meet your soulmate, the first words you would ever hear them say show up somewhere on your body. There are both romantic and platonic soulmates and marks, they are differentiated through a difference of color. 
> 
> If I'm not careful, I'll have a full universe.
> 
> No beta cause I live life on the edge. All mistakes are mine.

Nathalie didn't know what to expect. Soulmarks were funny things in the first place, but she never expected that the dual soulmarks would climb her arms during her gap year while she was staying at a Tibetan monastery. It was a monastery.

She'd worked her way across continent, loving every single minute of it. Her trek had brought her to the monasteries that littered the slopes of Tibet. It was breath taking being surrounded by the mountains that towered high above in the sky to a dizzying height. It was more than she could have ever asked for in gap year. She almost dreaded heading back home, to start school, she honestly had no idea what she wanted to do with her life. She was too young to have figured it out yet. Her heart went in a million different directions. She couldn't just pick one thing, let alone the one thing she wanted to do for the rest of her life.

Then her soulmarks had to show up and make everything even more confusing. They twined up her forearms like vines, which was not in the easiest place to cover. Stupid fate. It was a good thing she was in Tibet where it was cold enough to need the layers that would keep the words hidden. If she had still been in Spain, she didn't know what she would have done.

Unlike most people, Nathalie hadn't cared if she ever got a soulmark. She watched as her classmates fell over each other trying to find their soulmate and fawning over the newest person that got their soulmark. She’d also watched the fall out of many a relationships because of it. If that was what it was like to find your soulmate, then Nathalie didn't want any part of the petty hormone driven slobbering.

She sighed as she surveyed the platonic soulmark on her left arm, it was much shorter than the romantic spanning her right. As she looked at them, she wasn't sure what to think. She couldn't help snorting derisively. What sort of people were they?

The next morning dawned bright and cold, the fresh morning misting with her breath as she exhaled crisp mountain air. Today she was hiking up the mountain to find the abandoned ruins of the Temple of the Guardians. It was one of the reasons that Nathalie had decided to end her year in Tibet. She had come across some obscure reference to the lost temple during her research for a history paper. It had sparked her interest. Today she as going to get up the mountain and find the Temple, she could feel it in her bones.

She had arranged for a guide up the mountain. It wouldn't have been safe to try the trek on her own, and though she preferred to be alone she’d much rather be alive. The woman was the sort of competent woman that Nathalie aspired to be, knowing exactly what needs to be done and won’t let anyone tell her what to do. Though her accent was thick, Nathalie found she enjoyed the stories the woman shared as they hiked the mountain.

As they neared the ruins, new voices could be heard. Still to far out the speech as just noise but as they neared it settled into intelligible words, surprisingly it was French. The sounds of it echoing in the narrow pass all around.

“What would you even say to trigger that, that silly power. _Go my pretty Akuma and evilize them!”_ A man’s voice said scathingly.

“Gabriel, you are assuming that you are the villain again.” A woman softly chided.

“Aren’t I though? Hmm, I kind of like that – evilize.”

Nathalie couldn’t help but snort, it was just as silly as it had been when she read it on her arm. Evilize?

“That’s not even a word.” The words were out, and she clapped a gloved hand over her mouth. Flushing in embarrassment at being caught eaves dropping by her own mouth. Two heads swiveled towards her just at the end of the passage. Both blonde but two different types, hers bright and golden like sunlight and his ashy nearly white. They were both beautiful and Nathalie felt hopelessly outclassed for a moment.

She and the guide made their way closer. The ground leveling off before the massive broken gates of the temple for which Nathalie searching. The couple watched her approach mouths hanging open. Her own awe was reserved for the dilapidated temple before her.

“What did you say?” The man asked carefully, drawing her attention to him. Her heart did some funny acrobatics in her chest at his steely intense look.

“Um, that evilize isn’t a word.” She looked away toward the woman, who was looking at her with a warm but nearly as intense look as the man.

“No,” He shook his head, then had to shove his hair back. “Your exact words?”

“Oh,” She repeated them.

“What do you know?” The woman looked at the man, who she assumed was Gabriel since that is what her mark and the woman had said.

“If you say something like ‘tibet is magic’ _you_ can sleep on the couch tonight, princess.” He grumbled, crossing his arms with the scratchy sound jacket fabric scraping together.

“Oh, boo. You just met your soulmate.” She pouted and shoved him lightly. Turning a smile on Nathalie.

“So, did you.” He commented dryly.

“Yeah, but mine is just another platonic. Yours is the romantic.” She held out a hand to Nathalie, making her step closer to take it. “I’m Emilie and this is Gabriel.”

“Nathalie,” she said pulling back her hand awkwardly and stuffing it in her jacket pocket. She glanced at Gabriel and found him glowering at her. Pursing her lips, she gave him an unimpressed glance. “Look, I don’t know what your problem is but you can take that scowl and shove it. I’ve never really be into the whole soulmates thing.”

She resolutely did not feel the unhappy dip her own words made her stomach do. It had actually made sense, when she had first seen him, the way her insides had seemed to swarm into butterflies. It felt both nerve-wracking and exciting, and if this is what it felt like then maybe all those silly antics of her classmates hadn’t been all that silly.

“Lovely to meet you Mlle. Emilie, but I am here to explore some ruins so if you’ll excuse me.” Nathalie nodded toward Emile before swiftly turning and walking over to her guide. She checked that it was safe for her to enter the crumbling ruins, then she was gone, torch in hand to see what mysteries were inside the lost temple.

“You should apologize,” she heard Emilie say, several rooms over. She ignored them and kept looking though the empty place.

“Did you hear what she said to me?”

“You were being a jerk! I remember how disappointed you were when we were only platonics. Why were you even acting like that? You are a hopeless romantic. A hopeless romantic that has been waiting for this as long as I’ve known you.” Emilie persisted.

“She doesn’t want anything to do with me or with you, so it’s better this way.” Gabriel said, his voice was resigned, even a little hurt. Nathalie did not feel the little stab that went through her heart, traitorous thing. 

She moved away from them, stepping through the dilapidated remains. There was a beauty to it, the empty desolate feeling of the long desertion, that left a sad feeling floating through the halls. She moved into a larger room, her toe catching on deep chasm that sent her stumbling. She caught herself on a pillar. Looking back at the gap, she found she was surprised to have missed it, it was large and deep and there was something glinting in the light of her torch at the bottom. Dropping down she shoved her hand into the gap, but her glove and sleeve caught on the edges. She sat back on her heels and pulled the glove off, feeling the sharp bite of the cold before she divested her jacket too. Dropping down on the frigid floor, she pushed her hand in again. Her fingers felt something hard, she dug around until her fingers curled around the little bits of metal. She pulled her bounty up. The pins were crusted in dirt save for the bare bit that had caught the light.

She quickly pulled her coat back on shivering a little, the cold having seeped into her bones. Her fingers were stiff as she pulled her glove back on. That was foolish. She tried to brush the dirt free, but it was persistent. Zipping the pins, into her pocket she turned to leave, her arms wrapping around herself.

On the way back outside, she ran into her soulmates. Literally. Gabriel caught her as she stumbled back, her body shivering as she struggled to get her core temperature back up. Gabriel took one look at her and thrust out a hand to Emilie.

“The thermos,” the cylinder was placed in his hand a short moment later. He placed a cup of still steaming tea into her hands. “Drink” he ordered her, and though she bristled at the command, the tea was already seeping pleasantly through her fingers, so she did. The heat warming her up again.

Maybe she was wrong about him. He was brusque, sure, but he was kind. He had seen her shivering and did something about it. Her heart did a little jump as she caught him looking at her, his gaze unreadable.

Emilie refilled her tea and sat down next to her, as she recapped the tea to keep it hot.

“You said something about platonics earlier?” Nathalie asked, the silence tense and charged, feeling the need to break it up. Emilie smiled warmly at her, and her left arm tingled a little.

“Gabriel and I are platonic soulmates.” She laughed looking at the man. “We met senior year of Uni.”

He flushed, burning red all the way up his ears. Emilie pulled back her sleeve a little, to show the two marks twining up her forearm, similar to Nathalie’s own platonic soulmark. It was too cold and the sleeve to bulky to show more, but she could see ‘Princess’. He had said that earlier, but now he seemed embarrassed by it. Emilie laughed a light little sound that echoed in the ruined room.

“Oh, I’m sure that my mark on him is worse, but since then, fast friends you might say. Soulmarks are funny like that, they guide you to the people that you fit with, but it’s up to you make it what you will.” Emilie remarked idly playing with the thermos.

“I bet it’s an interesting story,” Nathalie remarked wryly noting how his ears got redder. She sipped at her tea. It and the warmth it provided was rapidly dwindling.

“Hopefully, you never hear it.” Gabriel said.

“What about you, my dear? I’d like to know you a little better, if I may. Since we match and all.” Emilie tapped her arm, with a grin.

“There isn’t much to know about me.” Nathalie shook her head. The pleading look on Emilie’s face was really hard to ignore. “I’m just trying to figure out what to do with my life, and I have no idea what that is.”

“No one really does,” Emilie patted her hand. “I’ve always wanted to be an actress, but I still wonder if I made the right choice from time to time. What is it you think of when you think of you?”

“I don’t know. The thing I’ve always been best at was organization, but I love fashion week. There is something about the way the city comes alive, and all the unique things that get made and shared.”

Emilie looked pointedly at Gabriel. He looked away, and Nathalie felt like she was missing something.

“Fate is funny,” Emilie remarked, at her confused look.

He stood sharply and turned away. His action startling her. Nathalie looked up at him and was struck by just how handsome he was. He looked down at her a gentleness in his eyes that hadn’t been there before and held out a hand. She looked at his gloved hand, feeling the swoop in her chest. She reached out hesitantly to take it. Her forearm burned with heat, warming her more than the tea could have. He gasped, looking at her then down to his own arm.

He cleared his throat, softly, the corner of his mouth quirking up. “We should get back down the hill before you freeze or something.”

“But Gabriel, we didn’t find –“

“It doesn’t matter, Em, we have the book. We could always just come back later.” Gabriel cut her off. He ushered Nathalie before him, to leave the moldering ruins. Nathalie wasn’t sure if she was touched or annoyed at this. She settled for in between as they immerged into the thin light of such high altitude. The two guides looked up, from where they had been playing cards.

It didn’t take long before the much larger group was headed back down the mountain. The temperature warmed back up the further down they went until they were safely back down the hill in the town. She thanked and tipped her guide, and while Gabriel and Emilie were distracted doing the same, she left. Nathalie ran away. That was the only way she could even explain it to herself. She ran away. She ran away not even knowing their last names, or anything else about them.

She tried very hard not to feel the pain in her heart as she left Tibet the next day, knowing that she would probably never see them again. She had never really cared about soulmates, so why did it bother her so much. She was too young. She wasn’t ready for that kind of thing. Soulmates are the forever kind, and she still didn’t know what she wanted to do with her life. Emilie’s words came back to her, reminding her the things she liked best.

Maybe, just maybe, soulmates weren’t such a bad thing to have.

_~4 years later~_

Working Fashion Week was the best feeling she had ever had. If she ever met Emilie again, she would thank her, and maybe not run away again. It was her question that had led Nathalie into finally figuring out what to study at Uni and do for the rest of her life, at least well enough that she would enjoy her life. She was part of the team organizing the show at the Ritz. This was simultaneously the most amazing and most nerve-wracking thing that she had ever done. If she succeeded here, she could have her pick of jobs. The world would be her oyster.

There were going to be 15 different designers showing during the event, so she had to make sure that everything ran smoothly. The hotel was used to these shows and had their side well in hand. The organization of the designers was a bit harder. In theory it was fine. In run through it was absolute chaos. You’d think that none of them had ever done this before, the designers or the models.

She was walking through the staging area, barking orders at one of the interns, like she used to be, her radio going in her ear, when she heard him. That rumbling voice, shuddered through her, making her heart speed in her chest. She had tried to forget him, in the last four years focusing on her degree. But part of her never forgot, and never let her live down her actions to herself. She ran away like a coward, still thinking that soulmates were not very important. She knew better now. She was ready now.

She stopped abruptly, startling the intern, clicking off her radio only for a moment, she listened. Her forearm heated under the thin sleeve of her dark shirt.

“No, you don’t have the right expression. Less lip, more evil. I don’t want to see duck face. Come on, evilize it.” He was saying. She followed the sound of his voice through half dress models that smelled of hairspray and too much perfume. He was standing before a model, trying to get her expression right without actually touching her.

“You know, that’s still not a word.” She said with a shy nervous smile. His shoulders tensed, his words falling away mid instruction. When he turned to look at her, he looked even better than she remembered. Perhaps, that was because he was not swaddled in winterwear this time, or she wanted to see him this time.

His mouth fell open, his shock colored by pleasure, like he couldn’t tell if he was more surprised or happy. He took a step toward her, asking her if it was okay with a look. Her smile grew as she nodded stepping toward him, her arms open in invitation.

If you asked the models, they would have told you that it was the sappiest thing they had ever seen as Gabriel swept her up in his arms. Gabriel lifted her off her feet in a joyful embrace, spinning around, making both of them laugh. It mended the place in her heart that had been empty since the moment she left Tibet. She leaned into his hold even after her feet were safely back on the ground.

“I’m sorry,” It came out as a whisper, tears burning in her eyes.

“Fate has a funny way of working out.” He murmured. Holding her even closer, “Don’t get me wrong. I was pissed when you disappeared, and we will be talking about that, but right now I don’t care.

“Do mine eyes deceive me or is that our Nathalie?” Emilie’s voice trilled behind them. Her arms wrapping around the both of them and squeezing the air out of Gabriel and Nathalie. There was breathless laughter from the trio.

“Mlle. Sancoeur,” came the timid voice beyond their trio. She looked to the terrified looking intern from the circle of arms on both sides. She slapped herself on the forehead and clicked her radio back on to frantic yelling.

_Anyone seen Nathalie?_

_One of the racks is missing! Check with Nathalie, she would know._

_Where the heck are the models for designer 3?_

_Mlle. Graham de Vanily is asking for -_

_There seems to be some hang-up backstage. Yvette, see what it is!_

“Sancoeur here, the racks for Designer 5 are in the green room.” She barked her voice dropping into command mode. “I’m already backstage, Yvette, you keep control of the run through.”

There was a smattering of confirmation and relief at her reappearance. The intern handed her clipboard that had fallen out of her hand, what felt like so long ago.

“Wow, you sound so official.” Emilie teased.

“I should, I’m one of the organizers.” She smiled cockily. Then it hit. Gabriel was in the staging area of the show, working with a model. One of the designers on the list, she looked at her clipboard, Gabriel Agreste. Her Gabriel was Gabriel Agreste. Oh lord, Gabriel Agreste was her soulmate. Her modern fashion class had done an entire week on his work, though notoriously camera shy there hadn’t been a single picture so how could she have known. Fate was funny.

The radio crackled in her ear.

“We’ll have to talk after the show,” She had to force herself to turn away. “I promise I won’t run away this time.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” He caught her hand, pressing a kiss there to much tittering and one very shocked intern.

Her mind kept straying to him, if she caught a moment where her mind wasn’t filled with making sure the show went off without a hitch. Which thankfully it did. And his set had been amazing, which only made her think of him more. She could see them hovering. Well, Gabriel was hovering, and Emilie was trying to keep him from hovering. She was not doing a particularly good job, but it was sweet to see that he was not going to let her disappear again. She promised she would not, but she could forgive him, it was her own fault after all.

It was late, when the last of the pieces had been packed away, and the show shut down until the next one. Gabriel took her hand while Emilie took her arm as they found a late-night café to settle around a small table and share a drink.

“I should thank you, Emilie.” She placed her cup back on its saucer with a little clink. “Without your help I wouldn’t have found what I wanted to do.” She laughed lightly, “which brought me back to you.”

“Fate is funny like that,” Emilie said with an enigmatic smile.

“Yes, it is.” Nathalie looked at Gabriel, her fingers playing with the little handle of her cup. “I wasn’t ready, yet. I was just a stupid kid still stuck in my own self-importance. I shouldn’t have done that to you. I was wrong, but” Her cup jumped on the saucer, spilling some coffee from her nervous fingers. “But it’s my choice now and I’d like to see where this goes, if you are still -?” she trailed off, voice tight.

His leg was pressed lightly against hers under the table, the causal way he was sitting took up a lot of space, and it was a surprisingly comfortable pressure that she found she quite liked. His steely intense gaze moved slowly up from his café au lait to look at her, face impassive. There was a jolt under the table, and a little hiss of pain escaped him before the sunshine smile lit his face.

“Of course, I plan on courting you right.” His eyebrows wiggled. His fingers lightly touched her arm, and the mark flared heating like fire, fading out without and ember. He must have registered her shock at the feeling because his fingers jerked back, alarm on his face.

“It was just my mark.” He relaxed at that.

“Could I see it?”

She pulled back the sleeve, to show the curving line of his words on her forearm. His fingers lightly touched her mark again, and it buzzed faintly but didn’t burn. She smiled at him, enjoying the feeling. Gabriel rolled back the sleeve on his right forearm showing her cramped handwriting following the same path as her, up his arm. Her fingertips traced the letters, with his permission, and she could tell when the feeling swept over him.

“Oh, that’s certainly something.” He grinned tangling their fingers together.

“Yeah, you are.”

“My god, will you be that sappy forever?” Emilie asked scoffing indelicately through a smile. They fell into happy laughter all three of them.

~

Eventually, she got the full story of Emilie and Gabriel’s mark. It left her chortling limply on Gabriel until he shoved her away, annoyed.

 _“It was dress rehearsals, the last run through before opening night of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. I was cast as Helena. It had been a week and I still didn’t have my costume, which was irritating,”_ Emilie glared at Gabriel while she said this. “ _So, I was already irritated, and this was the final dress rehearsal. I was trying to get into the dressing room for my makeup and in the hallway blocking the door, with his ass sticking up, was Gabriel. Apparently, he was fixing something on the hem of my costume, but I only saw an **ass** in my way. _

_“So, I say to him, absolutely no remorse ‘I’m sorry but could you get your enormous ass out of the way.”_

_“He paused and looked at me, and then he says. ‘Princess, if you want your costume done in time for opening night, deal with it.’ Then he slapped his own ass and turned back to the dress. I was so shocked. It took a full minute for it sink in that we were soulmates.”_

“Was he wearing the red pants?”

“Yes!”

“I hate you both.”

**Author's Note:**

> I swear, I love GabeNath but their love story is never a simple one when I write it. Hope you like it!
> 
> This can also be read as Sangrestes, but I just wanted some sweet friend bonding, since normally my Emilie is a villain, with GabeNath (because I love them). 
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
